Smokehead Islay Single Malt

Heavy peat, loud nose and taste but not so complex in the background

One of the best things about the holiday period, I have newly discovered, is the availability of distillery miniature tasting packs, or rather, the post holidays sales price. I managed to pick up a three pack of Smokeheads for a meagre AUD$20. A nice cheap little foray into mysterious (*cough* Caol Ila *cough*) Islay sourced peated malts. I’m quite keen to revisit the Rum Rebel, which I had some time ago, but I have no expectations of the other two in the box and am happy to go along for the ride here. N: A slightly oily arrival with pleasantly phenolic and maritime (wet seaweed and brine) character. The peat is undeniable and permeates everything with a strong rubber and lesser ashy wood smoke profile. Softer elements of malt are here as buttered, toasted brioche. The longer I give this the more a light apple juice sweetness comes out. Nothing here smacks me about as you may be led to believe with packaging adjectives like ‘monstrous’, rather this is actually quite restrained and enjoyable. P: A soft and juicy arrival with good body. There is a rapid development of lightly honied maltiness that then gets flooded wth a strongly ashy (and perhaps mineralic?) smoke, a medicinal and slightly peppery to chilli like envelope comes in towards the end. A simple progression, but not uninteresting. The juicy sweetness, albeit generic, is refreshing against the somewhat one dimensional smoke if you concentrate on it. The brininess front he nose is just about here but it gets interrupted by a late spirit presence that somewhat detracts from the overall palate. F: Long. Ashy, briny and a little mineralic, plenty of chilli spice. Ok ok ok, I’m not disappointed. It would be unreasonable to expect much from an almost novelty branded NAS mystery malt at an aggressively low price for my Australian market; but you get plenty. Enjoyable nose, reasonable but slightly young palate, good texture, and a lasting finish. The official score here of 69 is unwarranted, the average user score seems to come out at a reasonable conclusion. An acceptable, perfectly enjoyable, no nonsense peat focused dram. A good introduction to Islay; probably not. But, a good one for fans of smokey cocktails or when you don’t want to think about your smoky pour, absolutely. I am now reminded though that JW Double Black exists for this exact purpose (in my books), and its a touch cheaper, a little more interesting, and probably my preferred option. Distiller whisky taste #158 [Pictured here with a skull for a skull branded whisky. This skull is a replica of the famous ‘Lucy’ the ~40% complete fossil of a female Australopithecus afarensis found in the Afar valley of Ethiopia in 1974. Lucy’s other name, is Dinkinesh, which in the local Amharic language means ‘you are marvellous’. This beautiful lady is 3.2 million years old and demonstrates an important part of the evolutionary story of modern man; that bipedalism developed prior to rapidly increasing brain sizes.]

Campfire smoke.

Smoky and peaty but nothing special